Posts by brentcrystal

Thanks brownsug! Out of Billy's many videos, which ones are the best?

you're smart to rest when you're sick, so many people dont! you should be fine. cardio doesnt start to decline until about 2 weeks and strength declines after about a week but only very very minimally. but you may feel weaker due to your sickness.

I prefer to separate the workouts when possible because then you are fresh and can push yourself harder.

Definately eat after you workout!! I'm a fitness instructor and studied nutrition in college- your body needs the nutrients to repair. Eat within the first 30 min after exercise. Try changing your pre-workout snack to something with carbs (raisins?), fat takes too long to digest and won't help as much. When you're trying to cut calories, they should not be cut from your pre and post-workout snacks/meals. You need the pre for fuel and the post for repair. Also, not eating after you workout produces stress hormones which cause you to conserve energy (aka slow metabolism)

Oatmeal is great for you! It's one of the best "sweets" you can have!

And keep up the workouts, it's better for your health.

HI, I'm a fitness instructor writing on my husbands account - Sounds like your workouts are great. Just keep switching up your workouts so you don't get too used to anything. Also, measure your food and count your calories, it's very difficult to estimate properly. Eat about 500 cal less than you burn to lose 1 lb a week which is the best way to lose fat not muscle. I'm 5'5'' and weight 127, body fat 21%. Women shouldn't be under 20%. Since you don't have much to lose, just stick with it and don't do anything drastic. Your increased exercise (and increased muscle) will take care of the extra couple pounds.

try doing hill intervals on the treadmill - run a hill for 1 min then flat for 1 min. I also like to do stairs for 15 min, treadmill for 15 and bike for 15 to mix it up. Try some weights or going to a class/ doing a video. Your body does get "immune" to whatever exercises you do after doing then for a while (adaptation) so switching it up keeps you challenged and interested!

Hi! I'm actually writing from my husbands account cuz I enter all his stuff. Anyway... for lower body, I highly recommend plyometrics (jumping and speed drills... check out youtube) and short, intense sprints. I started HS coaching track last spring so I was doing these with the kids a few days a week and I saw results so fast. I have always run but tended to do long runs not sprints or plyo and my body definately changed. My leg muscles got very defined (and a little bigger - no stick legs!). My husband, family, and even the kids I coached commented on my muscular legs! For upper body- bicep curls, push ups and lateral shoulder raises. For abs I recommend pilates or AbRipper200 by Beachbody. Good luck!

A certain level of soreness is to be expected when starting an exercise program, but pain is not required to see improvements. My advise would be to continue with your exercise schedule as planned but do something different, maybe walking (marching/jumping jacks etc) or some other form of exercise. This will allow those specific muscles to recover while you still get to exercise. Sore muscles recover faster when you get moving because blood flow increases. Also, be sure to stretch after your workout to help prevent soreness. Good luck and stick with it! It will only get easier!  

Hi! First off, congratulations for your weight loss and commitment to improving your health! I am so glad to see someone taking control of their health at such a young age. I am a certified fitness instructor and love to talk about this stuff so here we go...

Generally a weight loss of 1 - 2 pounds a week is recommended, as that will allow you to lose mostly fat. Losing weight faster than that risks lean tissue (muscle etc) loss. With that said, often more weight is lost when first starting a weight loss program because some water weight is lost and because you have a little less food in your digestive tract because you are consuming less. I suggest aiming to eat about 500 calories less than you burn each day. That will result in about one pound loss each week. With this moderate calorie cut you should not feel deprived or low-energy, making it easier to maintain. While more extreme calorie restriction may result in a quick weight loss at first, it also puts your body into starvation mode- making you burn fewer calories to conserve energy as a protection (also making you tired and slowing your metabolism). It also increases your production of the hormone ghrelin, which causes increased hunger. This combination often causing people to get discouraged, abandon their commitments and eat more than they normally would in response to their high ghrelin levels.

The moderate/vigorous question: Exercise is considered to be vigorous when heart rate is above about 150bpm. The intensity level is based on your effort, not speed. For example, a professional runner can run an 8 minute mile without even breathing heavy but for a beginner that would be a vigorous pace. Heart rate is a great way to monitor your intensity level. A heart rate of 130 - 140 is moderate, which is good because you are maintaining it for a whole hour. Vigorous exercise is more appropriate for shorter lengths of time. Calculating calories based on heart rate (and weight) is more accurate than activity because the heart rate says how hard you are working while the activity can only estimate based on how hard the average person works during that activity. Strength training is great, especially when cutting calories because it protects you from losing muscle while you lose weight and increases your lean muscle mass and resting calorie expenditure. However, it does burn a different number of calories than cardio exercise, depending on your intensity, of course. CC's burn meter does have weight training as an option so I recommend using that.

As far as calorie intake on workout and nonworkout days, that is up to you.  You just want it to even out by the end of the week. Some people find it less complicated to just eat the same number of calories every day, somewhere inbetween the calories they need when they workout and the number they need when they don't so that at the end of the week it all evens out. Other people like to determine their daily calorie intake based on their activity level for that day. I slightly prefer this method because you will most likely be more hungry anyway on the days you work out and it is a nice reward to get to eat more calories when you workout. It is also easy to adjust to adding or missing a workout.

Hope this helps! Good luck!